Prosecutor's mistake could affect outcome of trial for woman who was shot by police

Live testimony of a former Sterling Heights woman shot by police but facing criminal charges was upstaged Tuesday by a legal mistake that could affect the case's eventual outcome.

Caroline Hocking-Sullivan, 49, took the stand in her defense to counter accusations that she wielded a knife and charged at police officers before she was shot in the chest. She testified in direct conflict with police officers, saying she stood up from her living room couch without a knife when she was shot.

But after assistant Macomb County prosecutor Steve Fox tried to impeach her testimony with snippets from an audio recording of her hospital interview hours after the incident, Judge Mary Chrzanowski conceded the recording should not have been played in front of the jury without being subject of a hearing.

Chrzanowski ultimately decided to give a "corrective instruction," telling the jurors to ignore Hocking-Sullivan's statements on the recording.

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That came after the judge told Fox his offer for the interviewing detective to testify would fail to "correct your defect and maybe my legal error."

"The bell has been rung," she said. "Whether that statement comes in should have been decided. ...She was under the influence of all these barbiturates."

Hocking-Sullivan was under the effect of several legal drugs -- 10 anti-depressant pills, three alcoholic beverages and likely two pain killers -- at the time of the interview in a hospital bed.

Fox argued that Hocking-Sullivan understood and waived her Miranda rights, and appears alert in much of the full interview. But her defense attorney, Tim Barkovic, said she was not in the right state of mind to agree.

"You heard the tape; she can barely talk," Barkovic argued.

Chrzanowski said she would entertain the issue in a post-trial request for a new trial, if necessary.

The trial, which began Nov. 8, is scheduled to conclude Monday with arguments in Macomb County Circuit Court in Mount Clemens. The court is closed Wednesday.

Hocking-Sullivan, who now resides in Shelby Township, is charged with four counts of attempted murder for her alleged attempted attack on four officers in May 2011 in her then Independence Drive home. Police responded to the home about 11:15 p.m. on a call from her sister that Hocking-Sullivan was suicidal and possibly overdosing.

The defense claims that Hocking-Sullivan did not charge officers, and that Officer Maureen Merpi shot Hocking-Sullivan unnecessarily or accidentally, and officers conspired to fabricate evidence.

A key part of the hospital-bed interview for the prosecution is Hocking-Sullivan acknowledging that she had two knives that night, under a pillow and next to the couch. Police say they found a wooden-handled knife under a couch pillow a black-handled knife at her side after she was shot.

But on the stand Tuesday, Hocking-Sullivan said she doesn't remember saying that and insisted she only had one knife under a pillow.

"I'm positive the one with the wooden handle was the only one I had," she said.

She said she last saw the black-handled knife in a kitchen drawer.

Hocking-Sullivan, who is twice divorced and has three daughters, testified that she has slept with a knife or gun under her pillow since she was raped in her Sterling Heights home when she was 22 years old by a former co-worker who entered her home posing as a delivery man. The man was convicted but threatened her in telephone calls from prison, she said.

She said she kept the knife "for protection, but I didn't know what I'd do in the situation."

She said she "would never hurt anyone" but was suicidal.

That night, she said she wanted to kill herself, although she resolved she did not want to die and needed help. She texted and telephoned her sister, who believed she was suicidal and called police.

Police officers testified that one of them yelled "police" and "Caroline" several times after they entered the home with Hocking-Sullivan's sister and niece.

But Hocking-Sullivan testified that she was sleeping and groggy from the drugs and alcohol, and only heard a male say, "Let the dog out."

"I opened my eyes and my heart was pounding," she said. "I was thinking that I was dreaming that."

She said she then saw a light in the "very dark" house.

"It looked like a flashlight," she said. "It happened so fast I remember trying to get up. I thought I needed to escape if somebody was there and I needed to defend myself. I felt somebody was in my home. I was terrified."

"I didn't know officers were in my house. ... I can't go after somebody if they are not there."

She stood up from the couch, she said.

"I just felt something punch me in the chest and I fell down," she said.

The next thing she remembers she was in a hospital bed.

"I didn't even know I was shot yet," she said.

She said she thought police were at the hospital because they arrested a perpetrator. But she said she was shocked to learn she was being charged with a crime.

"I couldn't understand what they were saying," she said.

Officer Maureen Merpi and three other officers testified that Merpi was in the living room when she shot her, and another officer in the room shot her with a taser. Merpi testified she believed her life was in danger.

An expert defense witness, retired cop David Balash, testified Friday that Hocking-Sullivan was shot from farther away, the kitchen, at an angle, so didn't need to shoot.